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PLAIN TALK |
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Leonard Horwin
December 13, 2004
(310) 785-6600 tel.
(310) 785-6644 fax plaintalk@linkline.com http://www.leonardhorwinplaintalk.com |
Questions and Answers are cited below as
"Q" and "A"
1. Q: Why do I raise this question?
A: Because one of the greatest benefits from reaching 92 years of age, - should be, and is for me, - what I have learned.
2. Q: Why?
A: So that my family and I can benefit from the lessons learned, and extend the benefit to as large a segment of humanity as I can reach. That is why my website (www.leonardhorwinplaintalk.com) is designated "Mr. Public Citizen."
3. Q: Why the interest in the rest of humanity and not just yourself and family?
A: It was because my maternal grandfather believed strongly, - and passed the message on to me through his daughter, that Man owes a primary duty to serve the needs of himself and family for support.
4. Q: Is that all?
A: No. He believed and passed the message to me through his daughter, that Man also owes duty to mankind to make his own life as beneficial as possible, to the rest of humanity.
5. Q: Why?
A: Because that is the message of his religion, i.e., Judaism, - through observance of which, - the Middle East could be a Garden of Eden, and not just a time and place for man to pass through in the course of wars and threats of war and unabated violence.
6. Q: Is that a message only from Judaism and its Holy Bible?
A: No. It is also the message of later Christianity and Mohammedanism, attributed in each instance to the same monolithic "God."
It is also the main message of Confucianism and Buddhism and the Mithra (Persian, i.e., Iran sun-god).
7. Q: Did Man precede Judaism?
A: Yes. But the innate message of the predecessors of the Jew Abraham at Ur of the Chaldees (modern Iraq) was of an earlier stage in which progress was not contemplated. The accepted norm was of an all governing empire, more or less stationery, and not likely to change either in government or other aspects.
8. Q: Did Abraham's message imply what is covered later in the Decalogue (Ten Commandments), - with an implied duty to progress?
A: Yes, - and more.
9. Q: What more?
A: Life born of "God," - is Sacred, and not subject to the whimsies of monarchs, or dictators.
10. Q: Is there any Gentile summary of "Gifts from the Jews"?
A: Yes. The bestseller entitled, "The Gifts of the Jews" is written by a Gentile, - Thomas Cahill.
11. Q: Is there any difference between the Jewish faith and, for example, the Christian and Muslim faiths?
A: Yes.
12. Q: What is that difference?
A: The Jewish religion expresses an ultimate faith in the sacredness of life.
13. Q: Whereas the Christian and Muslim religions?
A: Jesus, and his Apostle Paul were devout Jews for whom the life of Man is sacred.
14. Q: And Christianity and Islam?
A: Christianity began well with Jesus and his Apostle Paul who believed in the sacredness of life. Accordingly, Christianity was anathema to the Roman Empire. However, in the Third Century A.D. the Roman Queen Mother Helen of the Roman Emperor, Constantine, convinced her son that Christianity, - albeit then a despised element, - could be a weapon to protect Rome against being overrun by the "Barbarians."
Constantine agreed and ruled that henceforth Christianity should be the state religion of Rome, so that the resulting Holy Roman Empire brought on the era of papal control.
15. Q: And?
A: Neither the papacy nor its ardent opponent Martin Luther, regarded themselves as bound by any command or sacredness of life. Accordingly Christianity, - too often engaged in suppression, torture, (including burnings at the stake) of those who might stray or be tempted to stray from the edicts of the Popes or of Martin Luther.
16. Q: And what about Mohammedanism (Islam)?
A: The Koran, - as Mohammed interpreted his dream of "Allah's" (God's) commandment to him and his followers- allowed for no non-believers, and therefore required him to exterminate the Arabian Jews at Medina.
The Koran, as Mohammed set it out, commands Mohammed and his followers to continue after the conquest of Arabia, with a quest for world hegemony for Islam. This was without option to the unbeliever, - other than to comply or convert to Islam, or accept a second-class citizenship with severe limits and tax penalties in the world conquered by Islam.
17. Q: And other faiths?
A: Mithra [the Persian (modern Iran) sun-god] required acceptance in what is now Iran but without conquest of the world.
The religions of Buddha and Confucius were essentially tolerant of alternative religious beliefs.
18. Q: Did Charles Darwin have anything to do with the foregoing?
A: Yes. He was the first to discover from the rocks and more, - the scientific certainty of evolution, as the primary proof of developing life.
19. Q: And what about the evolution of faith?
A: Yes. Darwin made no separate reference to religion. Scientific proof of evolution can be considered to imply that similar evolution would occur, and did occur, in Man's faiths.
Indeed, one of the strongest arguments in favor of a divine origin of Man and of the planet itself, is that, the progress of life has been more or less constant. All things considered, therefore, - there is suggestion of a possible divine plan behind the universe and what goes on within it.
20. Q: Any other indication of divine influence behind the universe?
A: Yes. The fact that life has progressed to the point, that Man is now able to sell passage to and from outer space, and to accomplish exploration of other planets, to the end, - eventually perhaps, - of finding other suitable habitats for Man.
21. Q: Am I correct in the lesson learned in my life, viz that progress is most likely to result from team effort rather than "loners."
A: Yes. But art can be inspiration to progress.
22. Q: What then is the essential lesson learned in the 92 years of my survival?
A: (1) Essentially, a duty to progress, and help others to progress.
(2) Treat others with tolerance, including, for alternative beliefs. There is no single answer about faith, and it therefore should not be misused to prevent human progress.
23. Q: Anything more?
A: Yes. It is noted that the progress of evolution, - albeit subject to slips backward, - in general is upward and forward, - resulting in ever quickening progress to this very day.
* * *
cc: George W. Bush, President
Richard Cheney, Vice President
John Kerry, Senator
John Edwards, Senator
Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense
Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of State Designee
Colonel Oliver North
Tom Ridge, Secretary of Homeland Security
John Ashcroft, U.S. Attorney General
Tony Blair, Prime Minister of Great Britain
Jack Straw, British Foreign Secretary
Newt Gingrich, Former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives
Ariel Sharon, Prime Minister of Israel
Benjamin Netanyahu, Economy Minister for the Israeli Government
Israel's "Women In Green" National Unity Coalition for Israel
Arianna Huffington, Syndicated Columnist
Oriana Fallaci, International Journalist, Interviewer and Author
Yohanan Ramati, Chairman, Jerusalem Institute for Western Defense
Gerardo Joffe, FLAME (Facts & Logic About the Middle East)
Mortimer Zuckerman, Editor in Chief - US News and World Report
Time Magazine
Washington Post - Attn: Bob Woodward
International Jerusalem Post
The Weekly Standard - Bill Kristol, Editor
The Wall Street Journal - Editorial and Op-Ed Department
The New York Times, Op-Ed Department
Los Angeles Times, Op-Ed Department
Dr. and Mrs. Jordan Phillips, Medical Books for China International